Evolution of the Rio Grande Valley ~ 1990 USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service

more at http://quickfound.net/

Evolution of the Rio Grande Valley in Southern New Mexico.

Originally a public domain film, slightly cropped to remove uneven edges, with the aspect ratio corrected, and one-pass brightness-contrast-color correction & mild video noise reduction applied.

The soundtrack was also processed with volume normalization, noise reduction, clipping reduction, and/or equalization (the resulting sound, though not perfect, is far less noisy than the original).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rio_Grande_Valley

Wikipedia license: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

The Rio Grande Valley is an area located in the southernmost tip of South Texas. It lies along the northern bank of the Rio Grande, which separates Mexico from the United States. The four-county region consists of Hidalgo, Cameron, Willacy, and Starr counties. It is one of the fastest growing regions in the United States, with its population having jumped from about 325,000 people in 1969 to more than 1,300,000 people by 2014. Some of the biggest cities in the region are: Brownsville, Harlingen, Weslaco, Pharr, McAllen, Edinburg, Mission, San Juan, and Rio Grande City...

The Rio Grande Valley is not a true valley, but a floodplain, containing many oxbow lakes or resacas formed from pinched-off meanders in earlier courses of the Rio Grande. Early 20th-century land developers, attempting to capitalize on unclaimed land, utilized the name "Magic Valley" to attract settlers and appeal to investors. The Rio Grande Valley is also called El Valle, the Spanish translation of "the valley", by those who live there. The residents of the Rio Grande Valley no longer refer to the area as "El Mágico Valle del Río Grande" ("The Magical Valley of the Rio Grande"), but as "The Valley”. The main region is within four Texan counties: Starr County, Hidalgo County, Willacy County, and Cameron County. As of January 1, 2012, the U.S. Census Bureau estimated the population of the Rio Grande Valley at 1,305,782. According to the U.S. Census Bureau in 2008, 86 percent of Cameron County, 90 percent of Hidalgo County, 97 percent of Starr County, and 86 percent of Willacy County are Hispanic...

Climate

The Rio Grande Valley experiences a warm and fair climate that brings visitors from many surrounding areas. The east side of the region experiences a humid subtropical climate, and becomes more arid as one heads west. The Valley is one of the southernmost areas of the continental United States, with only a small stretch of southern Florida laying at a lower latitude than the city of Brownsville. Also the region shares a similar climate to that of peninsular Florida. Due to its southerly location, the lower Rio Grande Valley tends to be very warm in comparison to northern areas. While having average temperatures that land the region a semi-tropical climate, the lower Valley only misses tropical climate status by a few degrees. Furthermore, the area lays in a transitional climate zone; therefore, cities like Brownsville and South Padre Island land in a tropical savanna climate classification during years when winter months are slightly warmer than average. Due to this, the lower part of the region has been known to sustain tropical plants such as flame trees, Cuban Royal palms, and coconut palms.

Temperature extremes range from triple digits during the summer months to freezing during the winter. Taking into consideration the region’s warm weather, periods of triple-digit weather occur much more often than those with freezing temperatures. While the Valley has seen severe cold events before, such as the 2004 Christmas snow storm, the region only occasionally experiences temperatures at or below freezing. These happen less often near the coast, where in some cases, never see temperatures below 35-40 degrees. Arctic cold fronts bring colder weather to the region but tend to dissipate quickly with daytime heating.

The Rio Grande Valley’s proximity to the Gulf of Mexico makes it a target for hurricanes...